
aass_AliI 
Book , 



EULOGY 



THE PROMISES OF THE OECLARATION OF INDEPENOENOE, 



EULOGY 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN, 






DELIVERKD BEFORS W 



THE MUNICIPAL AUTHORITIES OF THE CITY OF BOSTON. 



JTTNTE 1, 1865, 



CHARLES SUMNER 



BOSTON: 
TICKNOR & FIELDS, 

1865. 



.8 



1 4n cc!r T !aa a 



Printed by 

J. E. FAKWELL & COMPANY, 

37 CONGRKSS STRKKT. 



EULOGY. 



In the universe of God there are no accidents. From 
the fall of a sparrow to the fall of an empire, or the 
V sweep of a planet, all is according to Divine Providence, 
whose laws are everlasting. It was no accident which 
gave to his country the patriot whom we now honor. It 
was no accident which snatched this patriot, so suddenly 
and so cruelly, from his sublime duties. The Lord giveth 
and the Lord taketh away ; blessed be the name of the 
Lord. Perhaps never in history has this Providence been 
more conspicuous than in that recent procession of 
events, where the final triumph was wrapt in the gloom 
of tragedy. It will be our duty to catch the moral of 
this stupendous drama. 

For the second time in our history, the country has 
been summoned by the President to unite, on an appoint- 
ed day, in commemorating the character and services of 
the dead. The first was. on the death of George Wash- 
ington, when, as now, a day was set apart for simul- 
taneous eulogy throughout the land, and cities, towns, 
and villages all vied in tribute. More than half a century 
has passed since this early service in memory of the 



Father of his country, and now it is repeated in memory 
of Abraham Lincohi. 

Thus are Washington and Lincohi associated in the 
grandeur of their obsequies. Bat this association is not 
accidental. It is from the nature of the case, and be- 
cause the part which Lincoln was called to perform 
resembled in character the part which was performed by 
Washington. The work left undone by Washington was 
continued by Lincoln. Kindred in service, kindred in 
patriotism, each was naturally surrounded at death by 
kindred homage. One sleeps in the East, and the other 
sleeps in the West ; and thus, in death, as in life, one 
is the complement of the other. 

The two might be compared after the manner of Plu- 
tarch ; but it will be enough for the present if we glance 
only at certain points of resemblance and of contrast, so 
as to recall the part which each performed. 

Each was at the head of the Eepublic during a period 
of surpassing trial ; and each thought only of the public 
good, simply, purely, constantly, so that single-hearted 
devotion to country will always find a synonyme in their 
names. Each was the national chief during a time of 
successful war. Each was the representative of his coun- 
try at a great epoch of history. But here, perhaps, the 
resemblance ends and the contrast begins. Unlike in 
origin, conversation, and character, they were unlike also 
in the ideas which they served, except so far as each was 
the servant of his country. The war conducted by 
Washington was unlike the war conducted by Lincoln — 
as the peace which crowned the arms of the one was 



unlike the peace which began to smile upon the other. 
The two wars did not differ in the scale of operations, 
and in the tramp of mustered hosts, more than in the 
ideas involved. The first was for National Indepen- 
dence ; the second was to make the Republic one and in- 
divisible, on the indestructible foundations of Liberty and 
Equality. The first only cut the connexion with the 
mother country, and opened the way to the duties and 
advantages of Popular Government. The second will have 
failed unless it performs all the original promises of that 
Declaration which our fathers took upon their lips when they 
became a nation. In the relation of cause and effect the 
first was the natural precursor and herald of the second. 
National Independence was the first epoch in our history, 
and such was its importance that Lafayette boasted to the 
First Consul of France that, though its battles were but 
skirmishes, they decided the fate of the world. 

The Declaration of our fathers, which was entitled 
simply " the unanimous Declaration of the Thirteen 
United States of America," is known familiarly as the 
Declaration of Independence, because the remarkable 
words with which it concludes made independence the 
absorbing idea, to which all else was tributary. Thus did 
the representatives of the United States of America in 
General Congress assembled, solemnly publish and 
declare " that these United Colonies are, and of right 
ought to be, free and independent States ; that they 
are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and 
that all political connexion between them and the State of 
Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved . . • 



and for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reli- 
ance in the protection of Divine Providence, we mu- 
tually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and 
our sacred honor." To sustain this mutual pledge Wash- 
ington drew his sword, and led the national armies, until 
at last, by the Treaty of Peace in 1783, Independence was 
acknowledged. 

Had the Declaration been confined to this pledge, it 
would have been less important than it was. Much as it 
might have been to us, it would have been less of a 
warning and trumpet-note to the world. There were two 
other pledges which it made. One was proclaimed in the 
designation " United States of America," which it adopted 
as the national name, and the other was proclaimed in 
those great words, fit for the baptismal vows of a Republic : 
" We hold these truths to be self-evident ; that all men 
are created equal ; that they are endowed by their Creator 
with certain inalienable rights ; that among these are 
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness ; that to secure 
these rights governments are instituted among men, deriv- 
ing their just powers from the consent of the governed.'' 
By the sword of Washington Independence was secured ; 
but the Unity of the Republic and the principles of the 
Declaration were left exposed to question. From that 
day to this, through various chances, they have been 
questioned, and openly assailed, — until at last the Re- 
public was constrained to take up arms in their defence. 
And yet, since enmity to the Union proceeded entirely 
from enmity to the great ideas of the Declaration, history 
must record that the question of the Union itself was 



absorbed in the grander conflict to maintain those primal 
truths which our fathers had solemnly prochiimed. 

Such are these two great wars in which these two 
chiefs bore such part. AVashington fought for National 
Independence and triumphed, — making his country an 
example to mankind. Lincoln drew his reluctant sword 
to save those great ideas, essential to the character of the 
Republic, wliich unhappily the sword of Washington had 
failed to place beyond the reach of assault. 

It was by no accident that these two great men became 
the representatives of their country at these two different 
epochs, so alike in peril, and yet so unlike in the princi- 
ples involved. Washington was the natural representa- 
tive of National Independence. He might also have 
represented national Unity, had this principle been chal- 
lenged to bloody battle during his life ; for nothing was 
nearer his heart than the consolidation of our Union, 
which, in his letter to Congress transmitting the Consti- 
tution, he declared to be " the greatest interest of every 
true American." Then again, in a remarkable letter to 
John Jay, he plainly said that he did not conceive " we 
can exist long as a nation without lodging somewhere 
a power which Avill pervade the Union in as energetic 
a manner as the authority of the State governments 
extends over the several States." But another person 
was needed of different birth and simpler life to rep- 
resent the ideas which were now assailed. 

Washington was of a family which may be traced in 
English heraldry. Some of his ancestors sleep in close 
companionship with the noble name of Spencer. By 



10 



inheritance and marriage he was rich in lands, and, let it 
be said in respectful sorrow, rich also in slaves, so far as 
slaves breed riches rather than curses. At the age of 
fourteen he refused a commission as a midshipman in the 
British Navy. At the age of nineteen he was military 
inspector with the rank of major. At the age of twenty- 
one he was selected by the British Governor of Virginia 
as Commissioner to the French ports. At the age of 
twenty-two he was colonel of a regiment, and was thanked 
by the House of Burgesses in Virginia. Early in life he 
became an observer of form and ceremony. Always 
strictly just, according to prevailing principles, and order- 
ing at his death the emancipation of his slaves, he was 
a general and a statesman rather than a philanthropist ; 
nor did he seem to be inspired, beyond the duties of patri- 
otism, to any active sympathy with Human Rights. In 
the ample record of what he wrote or said there is no word 
of adhesion to the great ideas of the Declaration. Such 
an origin — such an early life — such opportunities — such 
a condition — such a character, were all in contrast with 
the origin, the early life, the opportunities, the condition, 
and the character of him whom we commemorate to-day. 
Abraham Lincoln was born, and until he became Presi- 
dent, always lived in a part of the country which at the 
period of the Declaration of Independence was a savage 
wilderness. Strange but happy Providence, that a voice 
from that savage wilderness, now fertile in men, was 
inspired to uphold the pledges and promises of the 
Declaration ! The Unity of the Republic on the inde- 
jtructible foundation of Liberty and Equality was vindi- 



11 



cated by the citizen of a community, which had no exist- 
ence when the Republic was formed. 

His family may be traced to a Quaker stock in Penn- 
sylvania, but it removed first to Virginia, and then, as 
early as 1780, to the wilds of Kentucky, which at that 
time was only an outlying territory belonging to Virginia. 
His grandfather and father both lived in peril from the 
Indians, and the former perished by their hands. The 
future President was born in a log-house of Kentucky. 
His mother could read but not write. His father could 
do neither, except so far as to sign his name rudely, like 
a noble of Charlemagne. Trial, privation, and labor 
entered into his early life. Only at seven years of age 
was he able to go to school for a very brief period, carry- 
ing with him Dil worth's Spelling Book, which was one of 
the three books that formed the family library. Shortly 
afterwards his father turned his back upon that slavery 
which disfigured Kentucky, and placing his poor effects 
on a raft which his son had helped him construct, set his 
face towards Indiana, which was guarded against slavery 
by the famous Ordinance for the Northwestern Terri- 
tory. In this painful journey the son, w^ho was only 
eight years old, bore his share of the burdens. On reach- 
ing the chosen home in a land of Liberty, the son aided 
the father in building the cabin, composed of logs fast- 
ened together by notches, and filled in with mud, where 
for twelve years afterwards he grew in character and in 
knowledge, as in stature, learning to write as well as to 
read, and especially enjoying Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress^ 
^sop's Fables, Weems's Life of Washington, and the Life 



12 



of Clay. At the age of twelve he lost his mother. At the 
age of nineteen he became a hired hand at $10 a month 
on a fiatboat, laden with stores for the plantations on the 
Mississippi, and in this way he floated down that lordly 
river to New Orleans, little dreaming that only a few 
years later, iron-clad navies would float on that same 
lordly river at his command. 

In 1&30, the father removed to Illinois, transporting his 
effects in wagons drawn by oxen, and the future President, 
who was then twenty-one years of age, drove one of the 
teams. Another cabin was built in primitive rudeness, 
and the future President split the rails for the fence to 
enclose the lot. These rails have become classical in our 
history, and the name of rail-splitter has been more than 
the degree of a college. Not that the splitter of rails is 
especially meritorious, but because the people are proud 
to trace aspiring talent to humble beginnings, and because 
they found in this tribute a new opportunity of vindicating 
the dignity of free labor, and of repelling the insolent 
pretensions of Slavery. 

His youth was now spent, and at the age of twenty-one, 
he left his father's house to begin the world for himself. A 
small bundle, a laughing face, and an honest heart ; these 
were his visible possessions, together with that unconscious 
character and intelligence, which his country afterwards 
learned to prize. In the long history of " worth de- 
pressed," there is no instance of such a contrast between 
the depression and the triumph — unless, perhaps, his 
successor as President may share with him this distinction. 
No Academy, no University, no Alma Mater of science or 



13 

learning had nourished him. No government had taken 
him by the hand and given to him the gift of opportunity. 
No inheritance of land or money had fallen to him. No 
friend stood by his side. He was alone in poverty ; and 
yet not all alone. There was God above, who watches 
all, and does not desert the lowly. Simple in life and 
manners, and knowing nothing of form or ceremony, with 
a village schoolmaster for six months as his only teacher, 
he had grown up in companionship with the people, with 
nature, with trees, with the fruitful corn, and with the 
stars. While yet a child, his father had borne him away 
from a soil wasted by Slavery, and he was now the citizen 
of a Free State, where Free Labor had been placed under 
the safec^uard of irreversible compact and fundamental 
law. And thus closed the youth of the future President, 
happy at least that he could go forth under the day-star 
of Liberty. 

The hardships of youth were still continued in early 
manhood. He labored as a hired hand on a farm, and 
then a second time he measured the winding Mississippi 
to New Orleans in a flatboat. At the call of the Gov- 
ernor of Illinois for troops against the Indian Chief Black 
Hawk, he sprang forward with patriotic ardor, and was 
the first to enlist at the recruiting station in his neighbor- 
hood. The choice of his associates made him captain. 
After the war he became a surveyor, and down to his 
death retained a practical' and scientific knowledge of this 
business. In 1834, he was elected to the Legislature of 
Illinois, and two years later he was admitted to the practice 
of the law. He was now twenty-seven years old, and, under 

8 



14 



the benignant influence of Republican Institutions, he had 
already entered upon the double career of a lawyer and a 
legislator, with the gates of the Future opening on their 
hinges before him. 

How well he served in these two characters I need 
not stop to tell. It is enough if I exhibit the stages 
of his advance, that you may understand how he became 
the representative of his country at so grand a moment 
of history. It is needless to say that his opportunities 
of study as a lawyer must have been small, but he 
was industrious in each individual case, and thus daily 
added to his stores of professional experience. Faithful 
in all things, most conscientious in his conduct at the 
bar, so that he could not be unfair to the other side, 
and admirably sensitive to the behests of justice, so that 
he could not argue on the wrong side, he acquired 
a name for honesty, which, beginning with the com- 
munity in which he lived, became proverbial through- 
out his State ; while his genial, mirthful, overflowing 
nature, apt at anecdote and story, made him a favor- 
ite companion where he was personally known. His 
opinions on public questions were early fixed, under the 
example and teachings of Henry Clay, and he never 
departed from them, though constantly tempted, or 
pressed by local majorities, speaking in the name of 
a false democracy. It is interesting to know that thus 
early he espoused those two ideas, which entered so 
largely into the terrible responsibihties of his latter 
years, — I mean the Unity of the Republic, and the 
supreme value of Liberty. He did not beUeve that 



15 



a State had a right, at its own mad will, to break up 
this Union. As a reader of congressional speeches, and 
a student of what was said by the political teachers 
of that day, he was no stranger to those marvellous 
efforts of Daniel Webster, when in reply to the treas- 
onable pretensions of nullification, that great orator of 
Massachusetts asserted the indestructibility of the Union, 
and the folly of those who would assail it. On the 
subject of Slavery, he drew from the experience of his 
own family and the warnings of his own conscience. 
It was natural, therefore, that one of his earliest acts 
in the legislature of Illinois should have been a protest 
in the name of Liberty. 

At a later day, he became a representative in Congress 
for a single term, beginning in December 1847, being 
the only Whig representative from Illinois. His speeches 
during this brief period have many of the characteristics 
of his later productions. They are argumentative, logical, 
and spirited, with that quaint humor and sinewy senten- 
tiousness which belonged to his nature. His votes were 
constant against Slavery. For the Wilmot Proviso, he had 
voted, according to his own statement, " in one way and 
another about forty times." His vote is recorded against 
the pretence that slaves were property under the constitu- 
ion. From Congress he again passed to his profession. 
The day was at hand, when all his powers, enlarged by 
experience and quickened to their highest activity, would 
be needed to repel that haughty domination which was 
already so menacing to the liepublic. 

The first field of conflict was in his own State, with no 



16 



less an antagonist than Stephen A. Douglas, unhappily at 
that time in alliance with the Slave Power. The too 
famous Kansas and Nebraska bill, introduced by him 
into the Senate, assumed to set aside the venerable safe- 
guard of freedom in the territory west of Missouri, under 
the pretence of allowing the inhabitants " to vote Slavery 
up or to vote it down " according to their pleasure, and 
this barbarous privilege was called by the fancy name 
of Popular Sovereignty. The future President did not 
hesitate to denounce this most baleful measure in a series 
of popular addresses, where truth, sentiment, humor, and 
argument all were blended. As the conflict continued, he 
was brought forward as a candidate for the Senate against 
the able author of this measure. The debate that ensued 
is one of the most memorable in our political history, 
whether we consider the principles involved, or the way 
in which it was conducted. 

It commenced with a close, well-woven speech from 
the future President, in which he used words which 
showed his insight into the actual condition of things, 
as follows : " A house divided against itself cannot stand. 
I believe this Government cannot endure permanently 
half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union 
to be dissolved, — I do not expect the house to fall, — 
but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will 
become all one thing, or all the other." Only a few 
days before his death, when I asked him if at the time . 
he had any doubt about this remark, he replied, " Not 
in the least. It was plainly true, and time has justified 
me." With like plainness he exposed the Douglas pre- 



17 



tence of Popular Sovereignty as meaning simply " that 
if any one man shall choose to enslave another^ no 
third man shall be allowed to object," and he an- 
nounced his belief in " the existence of a conspiracy 
to perpetuate and nationalize Slavery," of which the 
Kansas and Nebraska bill, and the Dred Scott decision 
were essential parts. Such was the character of this 
debate at the beginning, and so it continued on the 
lips of our champion to the end. 

But the topic to which the future President returned 
with the most frequency, and to which he clung with 
all the grasp of his soul, was the practical character 
of the Declaration of Independence in annoimcing the 
Liberty and Equality of all men. These were no idle 
words, but substantial truth binding on the conscience 
of mankind. I know not if this grand pertinacity has 
been noticed before ; but I deem it my duty to say, 
that to my mind it is by far the most important feature 
of that controversy, and one of the most interesting 
incidents in the biography of the speaker. The words 
which he then uttered live after him, and nobody can 
hear of that championship without feeling a new motive 
to fidelity in the cause of Liberty and Equality. 

As early as 1854, in a speech at Peoria, against the 
Kansas and Nebraska Bill, after denouncing Slavery as a 
" monstrous injustice," which enables the enemies of free 
institutions to taunt us as hypocrites, and causes the real 
friends of freedom to doubt our sincerity, he complains 
especially that " it forces so many really good men 
amongst ourselves into an open war ivith the very funda- 



18 

mental principles of civil liberty, criticising the Declaration 
of Independence'' Thus, according to him, was criticism 
of the Declaration of Independence the climax of infidel- 
ity as a citizen. 

Mr. Douglas opened the debate on his side July 9, 
1858, at Chicago, by a speech, in which he said, among 
other things, " I am opposed to negro equality. I repeat, 
that this nation is a white people. I am opposed to tak- 
ing any step that recognizes the negro man or the Indian 
as the equal of the white man. I am opposed to giving 
him a voice in -the administration of the Government." 
Thus was the case stated on the side of Slavery. 

To this speech the future President replied the next 
evening, and he did not forget his championship of the 
Declaration. After' quoting the words " we hold these 
truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal," 
he proceeds to say : — 

" That is the electric cord in the Declaration that links the 
hearts of patriotic and liberty-loving men together, that will link 
those patriotic and liberty -loving men together as long as the love 
of freedom exists in the minds of men throughout the world. * * * 
I should like to know if taking this old Declaration of Indepen- 
dence, which declares that all men are equal upon principle, and 
making exceptions, where will it stop? If one man says it does 
not mean the negro, why not another say it does not mean some 
other man? If that Declaration is not the truth, let us get the 
Statute-book in which we find it and tear it out ! Who is so bold 
as to do it? If it is not true, let us tear it out [cries of "no, 
no " ] ; let us stick to it then ; let us stand Jirmlij by it then." 



19 



Noble words ! worthy of perpetual memory. And he 
finished his speech on this occasion by saying : — 

" I leave you, hoping that the lamp of Liberty will burn In 
your bosoms until there shall no longer be a doubt that all men 
are created free and equal." 

He has left us now, and for the last time, and I catch 
the closing benediction of that speech, already sounding 
through the ages, like a choral harmony. 

The* debate continued from place to place in Illinois. 
At Bloomington, July 16, 1858, Mr. Douglas again de- 
nied that colored persons could be citizens, and then 
broke forth upon the champion of the Declaration of 
Independence : — 

'* I will not quarrel with Mr. Lincoln for his views on that 
subject. I have no doubt he is conscientious in them. I have not 
the slightest idea but that he conscientiously believes that a negro 
ought to enjoy and exercise all the rights and privileges given to 
white men ; but I do not agree with him. / believe that this Gov- 
ernment of ours ivas founded on the ichite basis. I believe that it was 
established by white men. I do not believe that it was the design 
of the signers of the Declaration of Independence or the framers 
of the Constitution to Include negroes, Indians, or other inferior 
races, with white men as citizens. * * * Jjg icants them to 
vote. I am opposed to it. If they had a vote, I reckon they would 
all vote for him in preference to me, entertaining the views I do /" 

Then again, in another speech at Springfield, the next 
day, Mr. Douglas repeated his denial that the colored 



20 



man was embraced by the Declaration of Independence, 
and thus argued for the exclusion : — 

" Kemember that at the tune the Declaration was put foi'th, 
every one of the thirteen colonies were slave-holding colonies — 
every man who signed that Declaration represented slave-holding 
constitutents. Did these signers mean by that act to charge them- 
selves and al] their constitutents with having violated the law of 
God in holding the negro in an inferior condition to the white 
man? And yet, if they included negroes in that term, they were 
bound, as conscientious men, that day and that hour, not only to 
have abolished Slavery throughout the land, hut to have conferred 
political rights and privileges on the negro and elevated him to an 
equality, with the white man. * * * The Declaration of Inde- 
pendence only included the white people of the United States." 

On the same evening, at Springfield, the champiorr of 
the Declaration, while admitting that negroes are not 
" our equals in color," thus again spoke for the compre- 
hensive humanity of the Declaration : — 

" I adhere to the Declaration. If Judge Douglas and his friends 
are not willing to stand, bij it, let them come vp and amend it. Let 
them maJce it read that all mcii are created equal except negroes. 
Let us have It decided, whether the Declaration of Independence, 
in this blessed year of 1858, shall be thus amended. In his con- 
struction of the Declaration last year, he said It only meant that 
Americans in America were equal to Englishmen in England. 
Then when I pointed out to him that by that rule he excludes the 
Germans, the Irish, the Portuguese, and all the other people who 
have come among us since the Revolution, he reconstructs his con- 
struction. In his last speech he tells us it meant Europeans. I 
press him a little further, and ask him if It meant to Include 



21 



the Eussians in Asia ! Or does he mean to exclude that vast 
population from the principles of the Declaration? I expect ere- 
lono- he will introduce another amendment to his definition. He is 
not at all particular. It maij draw white men down, hut it must not 
lift negroes up" 

Words like these must be gratefully remembered. 
They make the Declaration, what the fathers intended it, 
no mean proclamation of oligarchic egotism, but a charter 
and freehold for all mankind. 

Again, at Ottawa, August 21, 1858, Mr. Douglas, still 
wishing to exclude the colored men from the Declaration 
of Independence, exclaimed as follows : — 

" I believe this Government was made on the white basis. I 
beliq^'C it was made by white men, for the benefit of white men and 
their posterity forever." 

The future President again took up the strain, as 
follows : — 

*' Henry Clay once said of a class of men who would repress all 
tendencies to liberty and ultimate emancipation, that they must 
if they would do this, go back to the era of our independence, and 
muzzle the cannon, which thunders its annual joyous return ; they 
must blow out the moral lights around us ; they must penetrate the 
human soul, and eradicate there the love of liberty: and then, and 
not till then, can they perpetuate Slavery in this country ! To my 
thinking, Judge Douglas is, by his example and vast influence, 
doing that very thing in this community, when he says that the 
negro has nothing in the Declaration of Independence. " 

At Jonesboro, September 15, 1858, Mr. Douglas made 



22 



another effort against the rights of the colored race, in 
the course of which he said : — 

**I am aware that all the abolition lecturers that jou find 
travelling through the country, are in the habit of reading the 
Declaration of Independence to prove that all men were created 
equal and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, 
among M'hich are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Mr. 
Lincoln is very much in the habit of following in the track of Love- 
joy in this particular, by reading that part of the Declaration 
of Independence, to prove that the negro was endowed by the 
Almighty with the inalienable right of equality with white men. 
Now, I say to you, my fellow-citizens, that, in my opinion, the 
signers of the Declaration had no reference to the negro whatever, 
when they declared all men to be created equal." 

At Galesborough, October 7, 1858, the future President 
thus again upheld the Declaration : — 

** The Judge has alluded to the Declaration of Independence, 
and insisted that negroes are not included in that Declaration ; and 
that it is a slander upon the framers of that instrument, to suppose 
that negroes were meant therein ; and he asks you, is it possible 
to believe that Mr. Jefferson, who penned the immortal paper, 
could have supposed himself applying the language of that instru- 
ment to the negro race, and yet held a portion of that race in 
slavery ? Would he not at once have freed them ? I only have 
to remark upon this part of the Judge's speech, that I believe the 
entire record of the world, from the date of the Declaration of 
Independence up to within three years ago, may be searched in 
vain for one single affirmation from one single man, that the 
ne.orro was not included in the Declaration. And I will remind 



23 



Judge Douglas and this audience, that while Mr. Jefferson M^as 
the owner of slaves, as undoubtedly he was, in speaking upon thi* 
very subject, he used the strong language, that *' he trembled for 
his country when he remembered that God was just." 

And at Alton, October 15, 1858, he renewed this same 
testimony : — 

< ' I assert that Judge Douglas and all his friends may search the 
whole record of the country, and it will be a matter of great aston- 
ishment to me if they shall be able to find that one human being 
three years ago had ever uttered the astounding sentiment that the 
term "all men" in the Declaration did not include the negro. 
Do not let me be misunderstood. I know that more than three 
years ago, there were men who, finding this assertion constantly 
in the way of their schemes to bring about the ascendancy and 
perpetuation of Slavery, denied the truth of it. I know that Mr. 
Calhoun, and all the politicians of his school, denied the truth of 
the Declaration, ending at last in that shameful declaration of Petit 
of Indiana, upon the floor of the United States Senate, that the 
Declaration was, in that respect, a " self-evident lie" rather than a 
self-evident truth. But I say, with a perfect knowledge of all this 
hawking at the Declaration without directly attacking it, that three 
years ago there never had lived a man who had ventured to assail 
it in the sneaking way of pretending to believe it, and then asserting 
that it did not include the negro." 

Lifted by the cause in which he was engaged, he 
appealed to his fellow-countrymen in tones of pathetic 
eloquence : — 

"Think nothing of me; take no thought for the political fate 
of any man whatsoever, but come back to the truths that are in 



24 



the Declaration of Independence. You may do anythino- with me 
^ou choose if you will but heed these saered principles. You may 
not only defeat me for the Senate, hut you may take me and put me 
to death. While pretending no indifference to earthly honors, I do 
claim to be actuated in this contest by something higher than an 
anxiety for office. I charge you to drop every paltry, insignificant 
thought for any man's success. It Is nothing. I am nothing. 
Judge Douglas is nothing. But do not destroy that immortal emblem 
of humanity — the Declaration of Indcjpendence.^' 

Thus, at that early day, before war had overshadowed 
the land, was he ready for the sacrifice. " Take me and 
put me to death," said he, " but do not destroy that 
immortal emblem of humanity — the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence." He has been put to death by the enemies of 
the Declaration. But though dead, he will continue to 
guard that great title-deed of the human race. 

The debate ended. An immense vote was cast. There 
were 126,084 votes for the republican candidates, 12I,9J:0 
for the Douglas .candidates, and 5,091 for the Lecorapton 
candidates, another class of democrats ; but the support- 
ers of Mr. Douglas had a majority of eight on joint ballot 
in the legislature, and he was reelected to the Senate. 

Again returned to his profession, the future President 
did not forget the Declaration of Independence. In 
answer to the Republicans of Boston, who had invited 
him to unite with them in the celebration of the birthday 
of Thomas Jefferson, he wrote a letter, under date of 
April, 1859, which is a gem in political literature, where 
he again asserted the supremacy of those truths for 



25 



which he had battled so well. In him the West thus 
spoke to the East : — 

*' But soberly, it is now no child's play to save the principles 
jof Jefferson from total overthrow in this nation. 

" One would state with great confidence that he could convince 
any sane child that the simpler propositions of Euclid are true ; 
but, nevertheless, he would fail with one who should deny the 
definitions and axioms. The principles of Jeflferson are the defi- 
nitions and axioms of free society. And yet they are denied and 
evaded with no small show of success. One dashingly calls them 
' glittering generalities.' Another bluntly styles them ' self-evident 
lies.' And others insidiously argue that they apply only to ' su- 
perior races.' 

" These expressions, differing in form, are identical in object 
and eflfect — the supplanting the principles of free government, 
and restoring those of classification, caste, and legitimacy. They 
would delight a convocation of crowned heads plotting against 
the people. They are the vanguard, the sappers and miners of 
returning despotism. We must repulse them, or they will sub- 
jugate us. 

"This is a world of compensation; and he who would &e no 
slave must consent to have no slave. Those who deny freedom 
to others deserve it not for themselves ; and, under a just God, 
cannot long retain it. 

" All honor to Jefferson — the ^an who, in the concrete pres- 
sure of a struggle for national independence by a single people, 
had the coolness, forecast, and capacity to introduce into a merely 
revolutionary document an abstract truth, applicable to all men and 
all times, and so to embalm it there, that to-day, and in all com- 
ing days, it shall be a rebuke and a stumbling-block to the har- 
bingers of reappearing tyranny and oppression ! " 



26 



In the winter of next year the Western champion ap- 
peared at New York ; and, in a remarkable address at the 
Cooper Institute, February 27, 1860, vindicated the policy 
of the Fathers of the Republic and the principles of the 
Republican party. After showing with curious skill and 
minuteness the original understanding on the power of 
Congress over Slavery in the territories, he demonstrated 
that the Republican party was not in any just sense sec- 
tional ; and he proceeded to expose the perils from the 
pretensions of slave-masters, who, not content with requir- 
ing that " we must arrest and return their slaves with 
greedy pleasure," insisted that the Constitution must be 
so interpreted as to uphold the idea of property in man. 
The whole address was in a subdued and argumentative 
style, while each sentence was like a driven nail, with a 
concluding rally that was a bugle-call to the lovers of 
right. " Let us have faith," said he, " that right makes 
might, and in that faith, let us to the end dare to do 
our duty as we understand it." 

A few months later this champion, who would not 
see the colored man shut out from the promises of the 
Declaration of Independence, and who insisted upon the 
exclusion of Slavery from the territories, after summon- 
ing his countrymen to dare to do their duty, was nomi- 
nated by a great political party as their candidate for 
President of the United States. Local considerations, 
securing to him the support of certain States beyond any 
other candidate, exercised a final influence in deter- 
mining his selection ; but it is easy to see how, from 
position, character, and origin, he was at that moment 



27 



pre-eminently the representative of his country. The 
Unity of the Republic was menaced. He was from that 
vast controlling Northwest, which would never renounce 
its communications with the sea, whether by the Missis- 
sippi or by eastern avenues. The Declaration of Inde- 
pendence was dishonored, in the denial of its primal 
truths. He had already become known as a volunteer 
in its defense. Republican Institutions were in jeopardy. 
He was the child of humble life, through whom Repub- 
lican Institutions would stand confest. These things 
which are so obvious now, in the hght of history, were 
less apparent then in the turmoil of party. But that 
Providence, in whose hands are the destinies of nations, 
which had found out Washington to conduct his country 
through the war of Independence, now found out Lin- 
coln to wage the new battle for the Unity of the Re- 
public on the foundations of Liberty and Equality. 

The election took place. Of the popular vote, Abra- 
ham Lincoln received 1,857,610, represented by 180 
electoral ballots; Stephen A. Douglas received 1,365,- 
976, represented by 12 electoral ballots ; John C. Breck- 
enridge received 847,953, represented by 72 electoral 
ballots; and John Bell received 590,631, represented by 
39 electoral ballots. By this vote Abraham Lincoln be- 
came President. The triumph at the ballot-box was 
flashed by the telegraph over the whole country, from 
north to south, from east to west ; but it was answered 
by defiance from the slavemasters, speaking in the name 
of State Rights and for the sake of Slavery. The declared 
will of the American people, registered at the ballot- 



28 



box, was set at nanglit. The conspiracy of years blazed 
into day. The National Government, which Alexander 
H. Stephens characterized as *' the best and freest gov- 
ernment, the most equal in its rights, the most just in 
its decisions, the most lenient in its measures, the most 
aspiring in its principles to elevate the race of man that 
the sun of heaven ever shone upon ; " and which Jeffer- 
son Davis himself pronounced " the best government 
that has ever been instituted by man," — that National 
Government, whose portrait is thus drawn by its ene- 
mies, was menaced. South Carolina was the first in 
crime, and before the new President had turned his face 
from the beautiful prairies of the West to enter upon his 
perilous duties. State after State had undertaken to aban- 
don its place in the Union — senator after senator had 
dropped from his seat, — fort after fort had been lost 
— and the mutterings of war had begun to fill the air, 
while the actual President, besotted by Slavery, tranquilly 
witnessed the gigantic treason, as he sat at ease in the 
Executive Mansion — and did nothing. 

It was time for another to come upon the scene. You 
do not forget how the new President left his village home, 
never to return except under the escort of death. In 
words of farewell to the friendly multitude who sur- 
rounded him, he dedicated himself to his country and 
solemnly invoked the aid of Divine Providence. " I 
know not," he said, "how soon I shall see you again"; 
and then, with a prophetic voice he announced that a 
duty devolved upon him " greater than that which has 
devolved upon any other man since the days of Washing- 



29 



ton," and he asked his friends to pray that he might 
receive that Divine assistance, without which he could not 
succeed, but with which success was certain. Others 
have gone forth to power and fame with gladness and 
with song. He went forth prayerfully as to a sacrifice. 

You do not forget how at each resting-place on the 
road he renewed his vows, and when at Philadelphia, 
visiting Independence Hall, his soul broke forth in 
homage to the vital truths which were there declared. 
Of all his utterances on the way to the national capital, 
after his farewell to his neighbors, there is nothing so 
prophetic as these unpremeditated words : — 

" All the political sentiments I entertain have been drawn, so 
far as I have been able to draw^ them, from the sentiments which 
originated, and were given to the world from this hall. I have 
never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the senti- 
ments embodied in the Declaration of Independence." 

*' Now, my friends, can this country be saved on this basis? If it 
can, I shall consider myself one of the happiest men in the world if 
I can help to save it. If it cannot be saved upon that principle, it 
will be truly awful. But if this country cannot be saved without 
giving up that principle, I was about to Say I would rather be 
assiissinated on the spot." 

And then, after adding that he had not expected to say 
a word, he repeated again the consecration of his life, ex- 
claiming, " I have said nothing but what I am willing to 
live by; and, if it he the pleasure of Almighty God^ to 
die 6y." 

He was about to raise the national banner over the old 
4 



3a 



hall. But before this service, he took up the strain which 
he loved so well, saying : — 

" It is on such an occasion as this that we can reason 
together, reaffirm our devotion to the country and the prin- 
ciples of the Declaration of Independence" 

Thus constantly did he bear his testimony. 

Slavery was already pursuing his life. An attempt was 
made to throw from the track a train in which he was 
journeying, and a hand grenade was found secreted in 
another. Baltimore, which lay directly on his way, was 
the seat of a murderous plot against him. Avoiding the 
conspirators of Slavery, he came from Philadelphia to 
Washington unexpectedly in the night ; and thus, for the 
moment, cheating assassination of its victim, he entered 
the National capital. 

From this time forward his career broadens into the 
history of his country and of the age. You all know it 
by heart. Therefore a few glimpses will be enough, that 
I may exhibit its moral rather than its story. 

The Inaugural Address — the formation of his cabinet 
— his earliest acts — his daily conversation — all attested 
the spirit of moderation with which he approached his 
perilous position. At the same time he declared openly, 
that in the contemplation of universal law and of the Con- 
stitution, the Union of these States is perpetual ; that no 
State, upon its own mere motion, can lawfully get out 
of the Union ; that resolves and ordinances to that effect 
are legally void ; that acts of violence within any State 
are insurrectionary or revolutionary ; and that, to the 
extent of his ability, he should take care, according to 



31 



the express injunction of the Constitution, that the laws 
of the Union should be faithfully executed in all the 
States. But, while thus positive in upholding the Unity 
of the Republic, he was determined that on his part there 
should be no act of oifense ; that there should be no blood- 
shed or violence unless forced upon the country ; that it 
was his duty to hold, occupy, and possess the property 
and places belonging to the Government, but beyond what 
was necessary for this object, there would be no exercise 
of force, and the people everywhere would be left in that 
perfect security which is most favorable to calm thought 
and reflection. 

But the madness of Slavery knew no bounds. It had 
been determined from the beginning that the Union should 
be broken, and no moderation could change this wicked 
purpose. A pretended power was organized, in the form 
of a Confederacy, with Slavery as the declared corner- 
stone. You know what ensued. Fort Sumter was 
attacked, and, after a fiery storm of shot and shell for 
thirty-three hours, the national flag fell. This was 14th 
April, 1861. War had commenced. 

War is always a scourge, and it never can be regarded 
without sadness. It is one of the mysteries of Provi- 
dence, that it is still allowed to vex mankind. There 
were few who deprecated it more than President Lincoln. 
From his Quaker blood and from reflection, he was essen- 
tially a man of peace. In one of his speeches during his 
short service in Congress, he arraigned military glory as 
" that rainbow that rises in showers of blood — that ser- 
pent eye that charms but to destroy ; " and now that he 



32< 



was charged with the terrible responsibility of govern- 
ment, he was none the less earnest for peace. He was 
not willing to see his beloved country torn by bloody 
battle, and fellow-citizens striking at each other. But 
after the criminal assault on Fort Sumter, there was no 
alternative. The Republic was in danger, and every man 
from President to citizen was summoned to the defense. 
Nor was this all. An attempt was made to invest Slavery 
with national Independence, and the President, who dis- 
liked both slavery and war, described, perhaps, his own 
condition, when, in a letter to one of the Society of 
Friends, he said, " Your people have had and are having 
very great trials on principles and faith. Opposed to 
both war and oppression, they can only j^racticaUy oppose 
oppression by war." In these few words the whole case 
is stated ;- inasmuch as, whatever might be the pre- 
tension of State Rights, the war was made necessary 
to put down the hideous ambition of Slavery. 

The slave-masters simply put in execution a conspiracy 
long pending, for which they had already prepared the 
way : first, by teaching that any State might, at its own 
will, break from the Union, and, secondly, by teaching 
that colored persons were so far inferior as not to be 
embraced in the promises of the Declaration of Indepen- 
dence, but were justly held as slaves in defiance of the 
declared principles of Liberty and Equality. Mr. Cal- 
houn, the Mephistopheles of Slavery, had, for years, in- 
culcated both these pretensions. But State Rights were 
merely a cover for Slavery. 

Therefore, when it was determined that the slave- 



33 



masters should be encountered, two things were resolved : 
first, that this Kepublic should live, and, secondly, that no 
hideous power, with Slavery blazoned on its front, should 
be created on our soil. In accepting the challenge at 
Fort Sumter, the President became the voice of the coun- 
try, which, with a stern determination, insisted that rebel 
Slavery should be put down by war. The people were in 
earnest, and would not brook hesitation ; and they were 
right. If ever in history war was necessary, — if ever in 
history war was holy, — it was the war then and there 
begun for the overthrow of rebel Slavery. 

From the first cannon shot, it was plain that the rebel- 
lion was nothing but Slavery in arms ; but such was the 
power of Slavery, even in the Free States, that months 
elapsed before this giant criminal was directly attacked. 
Generals in the field were tender with regard to it, 
as if it were a church, or a work of the fine arts. 
It was only under the teaching of disaster that the 
country was aroused. The first step was taken in Con- 
gress after the defeat at Bull Run. But still the Pres- 
ident hesitated. Disaster thickened and graves opened, 
until at last the country saw that only by justice could 
we hope for Divine favor,, and the President, who leaned 
so closely upon the popular heart, pronounced that great 
word, by which all slaves in the Rebel States were 
set free. Let it be named forever to his glory, that he 
grasped the thunderbolt, even though tardily, under 
which the rebellion staggered to its fall ; that, following 
up the blow, he enlisted colored citizens as soldiers in the 
national army ; and, that he declared his final purpose 



34 



never to retract or modify the Emancipatiou Proclamation, 
nor to return into Slavery any person free by the terms of 
that instrument, or by any of the acts of Congress, saying, 
loftily, " If the people should, by whatever mode or 
means, make it an executive duty to re-enslave such 
persons, another and not I must be the instrument to 
perform it." 

It was sometimes said that the Proclamation was of 
doubtful constitutionality. If this criticism did not pro- 
ceed from sympathy with Slavery, it evidently proceeded 
from the prevailing superstition with regard to this idol. 
Future jurists will read with astonishment that such a 
flagrant wrong could be considered at any time as having 
any rights which a court was bound to respect, and 
especially that rebels in arms could be considered as 
having any title to the services of people whose allegi- 
ance was primarily due to the United States. But, turn- 
ing from these conclusions, it seems to be plain, that 
Slavery, which stood exclusively on local law without any 
support in natural law, must have fallen with the local 
government, both legally and constitutionally ; legalli/, 
inasmuch as it ceased to have any valid legal support ; 
and constitutionally^ inasmuch as it came at once within 
the exclusive jurisdiction of the Constitution, where 
Liberty is the prevailing law. • The President did not act 
upon these principles, but, speaking with the voice of 
authority, he said " Let the slaves be free." What Court 
and Congress hesitated to declare, he proclaimed, and 
thus enrolled himself among the world's Emancipators. 

Passing from the Proclamation of EmaDcipation, which 



35 



places its author so far above human approach that 
human envy cannot reach him, I carry you for one 
moment to our Foreign Relations. The convulsion here 
was felt in the most distant places — as at the great earth- 
quake of Lisbon, when that capital seemed about to be 
submerged, there was a commotion of the waters in our 
Northern Lakes. All Europe was stirred. There, too, 
was the Slavery Question in another form. England, in an 
unhappy moment, under an ill-considered plea of " neces- 
sity " — which Milton tells us was the plea by which the 
fiend " excused a devilish deed " — accorded to rebel 
Slavery the rights of belligerency on the ocean, and then 
proceeded to open her ports, to surrender her workshops 
and to let loose her merchant ships in aid of this wicked- 
ness ; — forgetting all the relations of alliance and amity 
with the United States — forgetting all the logic of 
English history — forgetting all the distinctions of right 
and wrong — and forgetting also that a new Power 
founded on Slavery was a moral monster with which a 
just nation could have nothing to do. To appreciate the 
character of this concession, we must appreciate clearly 
the whole vast unprecedented crime of the llebellion, 
taking its complexion from Slavery. Undoubtedly it was 
criminal to assail the Unity of this Republic, and thus 
destroy its peace and impair its example in the world ; 
but the attempt to build a new Power on Slavery as a 
corner-stone, and with no other declared object of sep- 
arate existence, was more than criminal, or rather it was 
a crime of that untold, unspeakable guilt, which no 
language can depict and which no judgment can be 



36 



too swift to condemn. The associates in this terrible 
apostasy might rebuke each other in the words of an old 
dramatist : — 

Thou must do, then, 
"What no malevolent star will dare to look on, 
It is so wicked; for which men will curse thee 
For being the instrument, and the blest angels 
Forsake me at my need, for being the author ; 
For 't is a deed of night, of night, Francisco ! 
In which the memory of all good actions 
We can pretend to, shall be buried quick ; 
Or, if we be remembered, it shall be 
To fright posterity by an example 
That have outgone all precedents of villains 
That were before us. 

\_Massinger. Duke of Milan. Act I. 

To recognize such a Power ; — to enter into semi- 
alliance with it; — to invest it with rights; — to open 
ports to it ; — to surrender workshops to it ; — to build 
ships for it ; — all this, or any part of this, is positive and 
plain complicity with the original guilt, and must be 
judged as we judge any other complicity with Slavery. 

England led in the concession of belligerent rights to 
rebel Slavery. No event of the war has been comparable 
to this concession in encouragement to this transcendant 
crime or in prejudice to the United States. It w^as out of 
English ports and English workshops that rebel Slavery 
drew its supplies. It was in English ship yards that the 
cruisers of rebel Slavery were built and equipped. It was 
England that gave to rebel Slavery hclligerent power on the 
ocean. The early legend was verified in our day. King 
Arthur was without a sword, when suddenly one appear- 



37 



ed, thrust out from a lake. "Lo!" said Merlin, the 
enchanter, " yonder is a sword ; it belongeth to the Lady 
of the Lake ; if she will, thou may est take it ; hut if she 
will not, it will not he in thy power to take it.'' And the 
Lady of the Lake yielded the sword, so says the legend 
— even as England has since yielded the sword to rebel 
Slavery. 

The President saw the painful consequences of this 
concession, and especially that it was a first step towards 
the acknowledgment of rebel Slavery as an Independent 
Power. Clearly, if it were proper for a Foreign Power 
to acknowledge Belligerency, it might, at a later stage, be 
proper to acknowledge Independence ; and any objection 
vital to Independence, would, if applicable, be equally 
vital to Belligerency. Solemn resolutions, by Congress, 
on this subject were communicated to Foreign Powers ; 
but the unanswerable argument against any possible 
recognition of a new Power founded on Slavery was 
stated by the President, in a paper which I now hold in 
my hand, and which has never before seen the light. It 
is a copy of a resolution drawn by himself, which he 
gave to me, in his own autograph, for transmission to one 
of our valued friends abroad, as an expression of his 
opinion on the great question involved, and a guide to 
public duty. It is in these words : — 

*' Whereas, while heretofore States and Nations have tolerated I 

Slavery, recently, for the first [time] in the world, an attempt has | 

been made to construct a new nation upon the basis of Human f 

Slavery, and with the primary and fundamental object to maintain, | 

enlarge, and perpetuate the same, therefore | 



38 



" Resolved, that no such embryo State should ever be recognized 
by, or admitted into, the family of Christian and civilized nations ; 
and that all Christian and civilized men everywhere should, by all 
lawful means, resist to the utmost such recognition or admission." 

You will see how directly any recognition of rebel 
Slavery as an Independent Power is assailed, and how 
" all Christian and civilized men everywhere" are sum- 
moned " to resist to the utmost such recognition." Of 
course, had such a benign spirit entered into the counsels 
of England when Slavery first took up arms against 
the Republic, this great historic nation would have 
shrunk at every hazard from that fatal concession of 
belligerent rights, which was in itself a plain contribution 
to its early strength, and opened the way to infinite con- 
tributions, without which the criminal pretender must 
have speedily succumbed. But Divine Providence willed 
it otherwise. Perhaps it was necessary to the recognition 
of its boundless capacities, that the Republic should 
stand forth alone, in sublime solitude, warring for Liberty 
and Equality, and thus thecoma an example to mankind. 

Meanwhile the Avar continued with the proverbial 
vicissitudes of this arbitrameiit. Battles were fought 
and lost. Other battles were fought and won. Rebel 
Slavery stood face to face in deadly conflict with the 
Declaration of Independence, when the President, with 
unconscious power, dealt it another blow, second only 
to the Proclamation of Emancipation. This was at the 
blood-soaked field of Gettysburg, where a year before 
the armies of the Republic had encountered the armies of 
Slavery, and, after a conflict of three days, had driven 



39 



them back with destructive slaughter — as at that de 
cisive battle of Tours, on which hung the destinies of 
Christianity in Western Europe, the invading Mahome- 
dans, after a conflict of three days, were driven back by 
Charles Martel. No battle of the present war was more 
important. Few battles in history can compare with it. 
A year later, on the anniversary of this day, there 
was another meeting on that same field. It was of grate- 
ful fellow-citizens, gathered from all parts of the Union 
to dedicate it to the memory of those who had fallen 
there. Among these were eminent men from our own 
country and from foreign lands. There too was your 
classic orator, whose finished address was a model of 
literary excellence. The President spoke very briefly ; 
but his few words will live as long as time. Since Simo- 
nides wrote the epitaph for those who died at Thermo- 
pylae, nothing equal to them has ever been breathed over 
the fallen dead. Thus he began : " Fourscore and seven 
years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent 
a new nation, conceived in Liberty and dedicated to the 
proposition that all men are created equal.'" The truth 
which he had so often vindicated and for which he was 
willing to die, is thus heralded, and the country is again 
called to carry it forward, that our duty may not be left 
undone. 

" It is for us the living, rather to be dedicated here to the 
unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly 
advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task 
remaining before us, that from these honored dead we take in- 
creased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last measure 



40 



of devotion ; that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not 
have died in vain ; that this nation under God shall have a new 
birth of Freedom, and that government of the people, by the 
people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth." 

That speech, uttered at the field of Gettysburg, and 
now sanctified by the martyrdom of its author, is a mon- 
umental act. In the modesty of his nature he said : 
" the world will little note, nor long remember what we 
say here ; but it can never forget what they did here." 
He was mistaken. The world noted at once what he said, 
and will never cease to remember it. The battle itself 
was less important than the speech. Ideas are always 
more than battles. 

Among the events which secured to him the assured 
confidence of the country against all party clamor and 
prejudice, you cannot place this speech too high. To 
some who had doubted his earnestness, here was touching 
proof of their error. Others who had followed him with 
indifference, were warmed with grateful sympathy. There 
were none to criticise. 

He was re-elected President ; and here was not only a 
personal triumph, but a triumph of the Republic. For 
himself personally, it was much to find his administration 
thus ratified ; but for republican ideas it was of incal- 
culable value, that, at such a time, the plume of the 
soldier had not prevailed. In the midst of war, the 
people at the ballot-box deliberately selected a civilian. 
Ye, who doubt the destinies of the Eepublic — who 
fear the ambition of a military chief, — or who suspect the 
popular will — do not forget, that, at this moment, when 



41 



the voice of battle filled the whole land, the country 
quietly appointed for its ruler this man of peace. 

The Inaugural Address which signalized his entry for 
a second time upon his great duties, was briefer than any 
similar address in our history ; but it has already gone 
farther, and will live longer, than any other. It was. 
a continuation of the Gettysburg speech, with the same 
sublimity and gentleness. Its concluding words were like, 
an angelic benediction. 

Meanwhile there was a surfeit of battle and of victory. 
Calmly he saw the land of Slavery enveloped by the 
national forces ; saw the great coil bent by his generals 
about it ; saw the infinite garrotte as it tightened against 
the neck of the rebellion. Good news came from all 
quarters. Everywhere the army was doing its duty. 
One was conquering in Tennessee ; another was march- 
ing in Georgia and Carolina ; another was watching at 
Kichmond. The navy echoed back the thunders of the 
army. Place after place was falling — Savannah, Charles- 
ton, Fort Fisher, Wilmington. The President left his 
home to be near the Lieutenant- General. Then came the 
capture of Petersburg and Richmond, with the flight of 
Jeff'erson Davis and his cabinet. Without pomp or 
military escort, the President entered the Capital of the 
rebellion and walked its streets, from which Slavery had 
fled forever. Then came the surrender of Lee. The 
surrender of Johnston was at hand. The military power, 
of rebel Slavery had been broken like a Prince Rupert, 
drop, and everywhere within its confines the barbarous, 
government it had set up was tumbling in crash and ruin. 



42 



The country was in ecstasy. All this he watched without 
elation, while his soul was brooding on thoughts of peace 
and clemency. His youthful son, who had been on the staff 
of the Lieutenant- General, returned on the morning of 
Friday, 13th April, to resume his interrupted studies. The 
father was happy in the sound of his footsteps, and felt the 
augury of peace. On the same day the Lieutenant- General 
returned. In the intimacy of his family the President said 
that this day the war was over. In the evening he sought 
relaxation, and you know the rest. Alas ! the war was 
not over. The agents of Slavery were dogging him, and 
that night he became a martyr. 

The country rose at once in an agony of grief, and 
strong men everywhere wept. City, town, and village 
vras darkened by the obsequies, as they swept by with 
more than " sceptred pall." Every street was draped 
with the ensigns of woe. He had become, as it were, 
the inmate of every house, and the families of the land 
were in mourning. Not only in the Executive mansion, 
but in innumerable homes, was his vacant chair. Never 
before was such universal sorrow ; and already the voice 
of lamentation is returning to us from Europe, where 
candor towards him had begun even before death. Only 
a short time ago, he was unknown, except in his own 
State. Only a short time ago, he had visited New York 
as a stranger, and was shown about its streets by youthful 
companions. Five years later, he was borne through 
these streets with funeral pomp, such as the world never 
before witnessed. 

At the first moment it was hard to comprehend this 



43 



blow, and many cried in despair. But the rule of God 
has been too visible of late to allow any doubt of his con- 
stant presence. Did not our martyr remind us in his last 
address, that the judgments of the Lord are true and 
righteous altogether 1 And who will say that his death 
was not a judgment of the Lord ? Perhaps it was needed 
to lift the country to a more perfect justice and to inspire 
it with a sublimer faith. Perhaps it was sent in mercy to 
set a sacred irreversible seal upon the good he had done, 
and to put Emancipation beyond all mortal question. 
Perhaps it was the sacrificial consecration of those primal 
truths, embodied in the Declaration of Independence, 
which he had so often vindicated, and for which he had 
announced his willingness to die. He is gone, and he 
has been mourned sincerely. It is only private sorrow 
that could wish to recall the dead. He is now removed 
beyond human vicissitudes. Life and death are both past. 
He had been happy in life. He was not less happy in 
death. In death, as in life, he was still under the guar- 
dianship of that Divine Providence, which took him early 
by the hand and led him from obscurity to power and 
fame. Only on the Sunday preceding his assassination, 
while coming from the front on the steamer, and with a 
quarto Shakespeare in his hands, he read aloud the well- 
known words of Macbeth : — 

Duncan is in his grave ; 
After life's fitful fever, he sleeps well. 
Treason has done his worst ; nor steel, nor poison, 
Malice domestic, foreign levy, nothing 
Can touch him further. 



44 



Impressed by its beauty or by something else, he read it a 
second time. As the friends who then surrounded him list- 
ened to his reading, they little thought how, in a few days, 
what was said of the murdered Duncan would be said of 
him. Nothing can touch him further. He is saved from 
the trials that were gathering about him. He had fought 
the good fight of Emancipation. He had borne the brunt of 
war with embattled hosts against him, and had conquered. 
He had made the name of Republic a triumph and a joy 
in foreign lands. Now that the strife of blood was ended, 
it remained to be seen how he could confront those machi- 
nations, which are only 2i prolongation of the tvar, and more 
dangerous because more subtle, where recent rebels, with 
professions of Union on the lips, but still defying the 
principles of the Declaration of Independence, vainly seek 
to organize peace on another Oligarchy of the skin. From 
all these trials he was saved. But his testimony lives and 
will live forever, quickened by the undying echoes of his 
tomb. Dead, he will speak with more than living voice. 
But the author of Emancipation cannot die. His immor- 
tality on earth has begun. His country and his age are 
already euvshrined in his example, as if he were its great 
poet gathered to his fathers : — 

Back to the living hath he turned him, 

And all of death has past away ; 
The age that thought him dead and mourned him, 

Itself n«w lives but in his lay. 

If the President were alive, he would protest against 
any monotony of panegyric. He never exaggerated. He 
was always cautious in praise, as in censure. In endeav- 



45 



oring to estimate his character, we shall be nearer to him 
in proportion as we cultivate the same spirit. 

In person he was tall and rugged, with little resemblance 
to any historic portrait, unless he might seem in one respect 
to justify the epithet which was given to an early English 
monarch. His countenance had even more of rugged 
strength than his person. Perhaps the quality which 
struck the most at first sight was his simplicity of taanners 
and conversation, without form or ceremony of any kind, 
beyond that among neighbors. His handwriting had the 
same simplicity. It was as clear as that of Washington, 
but less florid. Each had been a surveyor, and was per- 
haps, indebted to this experience. But the son of the 
Western pioneer was more simple in nature, and the man 
appeared in the autograph. That integrity which has 
become a proverb, belonged to the same quality. The 
most perfect honesty must be the most perfect simplicity. 
The words by which an ancient Roman was described 
belong to him : Vita innocentissimus, proposito sanciissimus. 
He was naturally humane, inclined to pardon, and never 
remembering the hard things said against him. He was 
always good to the poor, and in his dealings with them 
was full of those "kind little words which are of the same 
blood as great and holy deeds." Such a character 
awakened instinctively the sympathy of the people. They 
saw his fellow-feeling with them and felt the kinship. 
With him as President, the idea of Republican Institu- 
tions, where no place is too high for the humblest, was 
perpetually manifest, so that his simple presence was like 
a Proclamation of the Equality of all men. 



46 



While social in nature and enjoying the flow of conver- 
sation, he was often singularly reticent. Modesty was 
natural to such a character. As he was without affecta- 
tion, so he was without pretense or jealousy. No person 
civil or military can complain that he appropriated to 
himself any honor that belonged to another. To each 
and all he anxiously gave the credit that was due. And 
this same spirit was apparent in smaller things. On one 
occasion, in a sally of Congressional debate, he said that a 
fiery slave-master of Georgia, to whom he was replying, 
*' was an eloquent man, and a man of learning ; — so far as 
he could judge of learning, not being learned himself." 
{^Congress. Glohe^ Appendix, \st session, '30th Congress, p. 
1042.) 

His humor has also become a proverb. He insisted 
sometimes that he had no invention, but only a memory. 
He did not forget the good things that he heard, and 
was never without a familiar story to illustrate his mean- 
ing. When he spoke, the recent West seemed to vie with 
the ancient East in apologue and fable. His ideas moved, 
as the beasts entered Noah's ark, in pairs. At times his 
illustrations had a homely felicity, and with him they 
seemed to be not less important than the argument, 
which he always enforced with a certain intensity of 
manner and voice. But this same humor was often dis- 
played where there was no story. I know not how the 
indifference, which many persons showed with regard to 
Slavery, could be exposed more effectively than when 
he said of a political antagonist, who was thus in- 
different, " I suppose the institution of Slavery really 



47 



looks small to him. He is so put up by nature that a lash 
upon his back would hurt him, but a lash upon any body 
else's back does not hurt him." And then, again, there 
is a bit of reply to Mr. Douglas, which is characteristic 
not only for its humor, but as showing how little at that 
time he was looking to the great place which he reached 
so soon afterwards. " Senator Douglas," said he, " is of 
"world-wide renown. All the anxious politicians of his 
party, or who have been of his i->a^*^y for years past, have 
been looking upon him as certamly, at no distant day, to 
be the President of the United States. They have seen 
in his round, jolly, fruitful face, post offices, land offices, 
marshalships, and cabinet appointments, chargeships and 
foreign missions, bursting and sprouting out in a won- 
derful exuberance, ready to be laid hold of by their 
greedy hands. * * On the contrary^ nobody has ever eoo- 
jaected me to be President. In my poor, lean, lank face 
nobody has ever seen that any cabbages were sprout- 
ing out. These are disadvantages that the Repub- 
licans labor under. We have to fight the battle upon 
principle, and upon principle alone." [Debate with Douglas, 
J). 55.) Here is a revelation with regard to himself, 
which is as honorable as it is curious. 

He was original in mind as in character. His style t^ 
was his own ; formed on no model, and springing directly 
from himself. While failing often in correctness, it is 
sometimes unique in beauty and in sentiment. There are 
passages which will live always. It is no exaggeration to 
say, that, in Aveight and pith, suffused in a certain poetical 
color, they call to mind Bacon's Essays. Such passages 



48 



make an epoch in State Papers. No Presidential mes- 
sage or speech from a throne ever had any thing of such 
touching reality. They are harbingers of the great era 
of Humanity. While uttered from the heights of power, 
they reveal a simple, unaffected trust* in Almighty God, 
and speak to the people as equal to equal. 

He was placed by Providence at the head of his coun- 
try during an unprecedented crisis, when the fountains 
of the great deep were broken up, and men turned for 
protection to military power. Multitudinous armies were 
mustered. Great navies were set on foot. Of all these 
he was the constitutional Commander-in-Chief. As the 
war proceeded, all his prerogatives enlarged and others 
sprang into being, until the sway of a Republican Presi- 
dent became imperatorial and imperial. But not for one 
moment did the modesty of his nature desert him. His 
constant thought was his country and how to serve it. 
Personal ambition at the expense of patriotism was as far 
removed from the simple purity of his nature as poison 
from a strawberry. And thus with equal courage in the 
darkest hours he continued on, heeding as little the 
warnings of danger as the temptations of power. " It 
would not do for a President," he said, " to have guards 
with drawn sabres at his door, as if he fancied he were, or 
were trying to be, or were assuming to be an emperor." 
And in the same simplicity he spoke of his return at 
morning to his daily duties as " opening shop." 

When he became President he was without any 'con- 
siderable experience in public affairs ; nor was he much 
versed in history, whose lessons would have been most 



49 



valuable. As he became more familiar with the place, 
his facility evidently increased. He had " learned the 
ropes," so he said. But his habits of business were 
irregular, and they were never those of despatch. He 
did not see at once the just proportions of things, and 
allowed himself to be too much occupied by details. 
Even in small things, as well as in great, there was in 
him a certain resistance to be overcome. There were 
moments when this delay caused impatience, and im- 
portant questions seemed to suffer. But when the blow 
was struck there was nothing but gratitude, and all 
confessed the singleness with which he had sought the 
public good. There was also a conviction, that, though 
slow to reach his conclusion, he was inflexible in main- 
taining it. Pompey boasted that by the stamp of his foot 
he might raise an army. The President might have done 
the same ; but, according to his own words, he " put his 
foot down," and 'saved a principle. 

In the statement of moral truth and the exposure of 
wrong, he was at times singularly cogent. There was 
fire as well as light in his words. Nobody exhibited 
Slavery in its enormity more clearly. On one occasion 
he blasted it as "a monstrous injustice"; on another 
he pictured the slave-master as " wringing his bread 
from the sweat of other men's faces " ; and then, on 
still another he said, with exquisite simplicity of diction, 
" If Slavery is not wrong, then nothing is wrong." 
Would you find any condemnation of Slavery more com- 
plete, you must go to the sayings of John Brown or to 
those famous words of John Wesley, when the great 



50 



Methodist held it up as " the sum of all villanies." 
Another mind, more submissive to the truth which he 
recognized, and less disposed to take counsel of to-morrow, 
would not have hesitated in carrying forward this judg- 
ment to its natural conclusion. Perhaps, his courage to 
apply truth was not always equal to his clearness in 
seeing it. Perhaps, the heights that he gained in con- 
science were not always sustained in conduct. And 
have 'we not been told that the soul can gain heights 
which it cannot keep '? Thus even while blasting Slavery, 
he still waited, till many feared that his judgment would 
" lose the name of action." Thus even while vindicating 
the Equality of all men, against the assaults of one of the 
ablest debaters of the country, and insisting, with admi- 
rable constancy, that colored persons were embraced 
within the promises of the Declaration of Independence, 
he yet allowed himself to be pressed by his adversary to 
an illogical limitation of this self evident truth, so that 
colored persons might be excluded from political rights. 
But he was at all times willing to learn and not ashamed 
to change. Before death he had already expressed his 
desire that the suffrage should be extended to colored 
persons in certain cases ; but here again he failed to 
apply that very principle of Equality for which he so 
often contended. If the suffrage be given to colored 
persons only in certain cases, then, of course, it can be 
given to whites only in the same cases ; or Equality ceases 
to exist. 

It was his own frank confession that he had not con- 
trolled events, but that they had controlled him. At all 



51 



the great stag:es of the war, he followed rather than led. 
The people, under God, were masters. Let it not be for- 
gotten that the triumphs of this war, and even Emanci- 
pation itself, sprang from the great heart of the Amer- 
ican people. Individual services have been important ; 
but there is no man who has been necessary. 

There was one theme in which latterly he was dis- 
posed to conduct the public mind. It was in the treat- 
ment of the rebel leaders. His policy was never an- 
nounced, and of course it would always have been 
subject to modification, in the light of experience. But 
it is well known that, at the very moment of his assas- 
sination, he was much occupied by thoughts of lenity 
and pardon. He was never harsh, even in speaking of 
Jefferson Davis ; and, only a few days before his end, 
when one who was privileged to speak to him in that 
way, said, "Do not allow him to escape the law, — he 
must be hanged," the President replied calmly, in the 
words which he had adopted in his last Inaugural Ad- 
dress, " Judge not, that ye be not judged." And when 
pressed again by the remark that the sight of Libby 
Prison made it impossible to pardon him, the President 
repeated twice over these same words, revealing unmis- 
takably the generous sentiments of his heart. The ques- 
tion of clemency here is the very theme so ably debated 
between Csesar and Cato, while the Roman Senate was 
considering the punishment of the confederates of Cati- 
line. Caesar consented to confiscation and imprisonment, 
but pleaded for the lives of the criminals. Cato was 
sterner. It is probable that the President, who was a 



^2 



Cato in heart, would on this occasion have followed the 
counsels of Caesar. 

His place in history may be seen from the great events 
with which his name is forever associated. The Procla- 
mation of Emancipation, — the military suppression of 
the Rebellion — his Republican example — and character- 
istic speeches are in themselves a broad foundation of 
fame. By the association of a common death he will 
pass into the same historic galaxy with Caesar, William 
of Orange, and Henry IV. of France, all of whom were 
assassinated, and his star will not pale by the side of theirs. 
Caesar was a contrast to him in every thing, unless it be 
in clemency, and in the coincidence that each was fifty- 
six years of age at the time of his death. But how 
unlike in all else. Caesar was of a brilliant lineage, 
which he traced on one side to the immortal gods, and on 
the other to one of the recent chiefs of Rome ; of com- 
pletest education ; of amplest means ; of rarest experi- 
ence ; of acknowledged genius as soldier, orator, and 
writer ; — being in himself the most finished man of 
antiquity ; but he was the enslaver of his country, whose 
personal ambition took the place of patriotism, and 
whose name has since become the synonyme of, imperial 
power. William of Orange was of princely origin, and in 
early life was a page in the palace of Charles V. In the 
long contest of Holland with Spain, he became the liber- 
ator of his country, which he conducted wisely, surely, and^ 
greatly, — anticipating the example of Washington. The 
name of " Silent" which he bore may suggest the -reti- 
cence of another. Henry IV, memorable for mirth, 



53 



anecdote, and pregnant wit, represented the idea of 
National Unity in France as the Supreme condition of 
national safety ; and his career has been illustrated by 
the popular epic of his country, La Henriade, of Voltaire. 
.These are illustrious names ; but there is nothing in them 
which can eclipse the simple life of our President, whose 
example will be an epoch in the history of Humanity, and 
a rebuke to every usurper — to be commemorated forever 
by history and by song. " I called thee from the sheep- 
cote to be ruler over Israel " said the Lord to David ; and 
whoever is thus called is more than Csesar. Such an 
ajjpointment was his ; and his simple devotion to Human 
Rights was more than genius or power. 

There is another character, who, like him, was taken 
away at the age of fifty-six, with whom the President may 
be more properly compared. It is St. Louis of France ; 
and yet here the resemblance is only in certain kindred 
features, and the common consecration of their lives. 
The French monarch, though at the head of a military 
power, was a lover of peace, and cultivated justice to- 
wards his neighbors. Under his influence, a barbarous 
institution was overthrown, and France was lifted in the 
career of civilization. Though in an age of privilege, and 
wearing a crown, he was moved to the practice of Equal- 
ity. History recalls, with undisguised delight, the simple 
justice which he administered to his people, as he sat 
under an oak in the park of Vincennes. Our President 
struck too at a barbarism, and lifted his country. He too 
practised Equality. And he too had his oak of Vin- 
cennes. It was that plain room, where he was always 



54 



so accessible, as to make his example difficult for future 
Presidents. But there were stated times when he was 
open to all who came with their petitions, and they flocked 
across the continent. The transactions of .that simple 
court of last resort would show how much was done to 
temper the law, to assuage sorrow, and to care for the 
widow and orphan ; but its only record is in heaven. 

Such, fellow-citizens, is the Life and Character of 
Abraham Lincoln. You have discerned his simple 
beginnings ; — have watched his early struggles ; — 
have gratefully followed his consecration to those truths 
which our fathers declared ; — have hailed him as the 
twice-elected head of the Republic, through whom it was 
known in foreign lands ; — have recognized him at a 
period of national trial as the representative of the 
unfulfilled promises of our Fathers, even as Washington 
was the representative of National Independence ; and 
you have beheld him struck down, at the moment of 
victory when rebel Slavery was everywhere succumbing. 
Reverently we acknowledge the finger of the Almighty, 
and pray that all our trials may not fail ; but that the 
promises of the Fathers may be fulfilled, so that all men 
shall be equal before the law, and government shall stand 
only on the consent of the governed, — two self-evident 
truths which the Declaration of Independence has 
announced. 

.Traitorous assassination struck him down. But do not 
be too vindictive in heart towards the poor atom that 
held the weapon. Reserve your rage for the responsible 



55 



Power, which not content with assailing the life of the 
Eepublic by atrocious Rebellion, has outraged all laws 
human and divine ; has organized Barbarism as a prin- 
ciple of conduct; has taken the lives of Unionists at 
home ; has prepared robbery and murder on the northern 
borders ; has fired hotels, filled with women and children; 
has plotted to scatter infection and yellow fever ; has 
starved American citizens, held as prisoners ; has 
menaced assassination always ; and now at last, true 
to itself, has assassinated our President ; and this 
responsible Power is none other than Slavery. It is 
Slavery that has taken the life of our beloved Chief 
Magistrate, and here is another triumph of its Barbarism. 
On Slavery let vengeance fall. I care not what you do 
with the worms it emplqys ; but do not — I entreat 
you — yield any indulgence to this murderous wickedness. 
Ravaillac, the assassin of Henry IV. of France, was torn 
in pieces on the public square in front of the City Hall, 
by four powerful horses, each of them attached to one of 
his limbs, and pnlling in opposite directions, until at last, 
after a fearful struggle, nothing of the wretched assassin 
remained in the hands of the executioner, except his 
empty shirt — which was at once handed over to be 
burned. Such be our vengeance ; and let Slavery be the 
victim. 

But not only Slavery, which is another name for 
property in man, but so also that other pretension, which 
is not less irrational, that Human Rights can depend on 
color. This is the shirt of the assassin ; and it must be 
handed over to be burned. 



56 



Such a vengeance will be like a kiss of reconciliation ; 
for it will remove every obstacle to peace and harmony. 
The people where Slavery once ruled will bless the 
blow which destroyed it. They will yet confess that it 
was dealt in no harshness to them, in no unkindness, in 
no desire to humiliate, but simply and solemnly, in the 
name of the Republic, and of Human Nature ; for their 
good as well as ours ; ay, for their good more than ours. 
•* It is by ideas that we have conquered, more than by 
armies. The sword of the Archangel was less mighty 
than the mission which he bore from the Lord. But if 
the ideas which have given us the victory are now neg- 
lected ; if the promises of the Declaration, which the 
Rebellion openly assailed, are still left unfulfilled, then 
will our blood and treasure have been lavished in vain. 
Alas ! for the dead who have given themselves so bravely 
to their country ; alas ! for the living who have been left 
to mourn the dead ; — if any relic of Slavery is allowed 
to continue ; especially if this bloody impostor, defeated 

« 

in the pretension of property in man, is allowed to per- 
petuate an Oligarchy of the shin ! 

And how shall these ideas be saved ? At this moment 
all turns on the colored suffrage in the rebel states. This 
is now the pivot of national safety. A mistake on this point 
is worse than the loss of a battle. 

The argument for the colored suffrage is overwhelming. 
It springs from the necessity of the case, as well as from 
the rights of man. This suffrage is needed for the secur- 
ity of the colored people ; for the stability of the local 
government ; and for the strength of the Union. Without 



57 



it there is nothing but insecurity for the colored people, 
instability for the local government, and weakness for the 
Union, involving of course the national credit. Without 
it the Rebellion will break forth under a new alias^ 
unarmed it may be, but with white votes to take pos- 
session of the local government and wield it at will, 
whether at home or in the national counsels. If it be 
said that the colored people are unfit, then do I say 
that they are more fit than their recent masters, or even 
than many among the " poor whites." They have been 
loyal always, and who are you, that, under any pretence, 
exalts the prejudices of the disloyal above the rights of 
the loyal ? Their suffrage is now needed. An English 
statesman, after the acknowledgment of the Spanish Colo- 
nies as Independent States, boasted that he had called a 
new world into existence to redress the balance of the 
old. In similar spirit, we too must call a new ballot into 
existence in order to overcome the preponderance of 
those who have not yet learned the duty of justice to the 
colored race. 

The same National authority that struck down Slavery 
must see that. this other pretension is not permitted to 
survive ; nor can there be any doubt that the authority 
which struck down Slavery is competent to this kindred 
duty. Each is a part of that great policy of justice 
through which alone can peace be made permanent and 
immutable. Nor can the Republic shirk this remaining 
duty, without leaving Emancipation unfinished and the 
promises of the Declaration of Independence unfulfilled. 
Vain is the gift of Liberty, if you surrender the rights of 



58 



the freedman to be judged by the recent assertors of 
property in man. Burke, in his day, saw the flagrant 
inconsistency and denounced it, saying, that, whatever 
such people did on this subject was " arrant trifling," and, 
notwithstanding its plausible form, always wanted what 
he aptly called " the executive principle." These words 
of warning have been adopted and repeated by two later 
statesmen, George Canning and Henry Brougham ; but 
they are so plain as not to need the support of names. 
The infant must not be handed over to be suckled by the 
wolf, but carefully nursed by its parent ; and since the 
Republic is the parent of Emancipation, the Kepublic 
must nurse the immortal infant into maturity and 
strength. It is the Repubhc which at the beginning 
took up this great work. The Republic must finish what 
it began ; and it cannot err on this occasion, if, in anxious 
care, it holds nothing done so long as anything remains 
undone. It is the Republic, which, with matchless 
energy, hurled forward its armies until it conquered. 
The Republic must exact that " security for the future," 
without which this unparalleled war will have been 
waged in vain. It is the Repubhc, which to-day, with 
one consenting voice, commemorates the murdered dead. 
The same Republic, prompt to honor him, must require 
that his promises to an oppressed race be maintained in 
all their integrity and completeness, in letter and in spirit, 
so that the great cause for which he became a sacrifice, 
may not fail. His martyrdom was a new pledge beyond 
any even in life. 

There can be no question here, whether a State is in 



59 



the Union or out of it. This is but a phrase on which 
discussion is useless. Look at the actual fact. Here all 
will agree. The old governments are vacated^ and this 
is enough. Until the whole body of loyal -people have set 
up a government, all is under the National authority, act- 
ing by the Executive or by Congress ; and, since the Con- 
stitution, even without the injunction of the Declaration 
of Independence, knows nothing of color, it is the obvious 
duty of the National authority to protect all loyal people 
against any denial of rights on this pretention. Already 
it has undertaken to say that certain persons shall not 
vote. Surely the same authority which may limit the 
electoral law of Slavery, may enlarge it. If the National 
authority can do anything about elections ; if it can order 
an election ; if it can regulate an election ; if it can ex- 
clude a traitor who is still at large, it can admit a loyalist, 
whose only incapacity is his skin. 

The colored suffrage is now a necessity. But beyond 
this, in making it an essential condition of the restoration 
of rebel States to the Union, we follow, first, the law of 
reason and of nature, and secondly, the Constitution, not 
only in its text, but as interpreted by the Declaration of 
Independence. By reason and nature there can be no 
denial of rights on account of color ; and we can do 
nothing which is thus irrational and unnatural. By 
the Constitution it is stipulated that the " United States 
shall guarantee to every State a republican form of 
government ; " but the meaning of this guaranty must 
be found in the Declaration of Independence, which is 
the controlling preamble of the Constitution. Beyond 



60 



all question the United States, when called to enforce 
this guaranty, must insist on the Equality of all Men 
before the law, and the consent of the governed. Such is 
the true idea of a Kepublican government according 
to American institutions. 

The slave-masters, driven from their first intrench- 
ments, already occupy inner defences. Property in man 
is abandoned ; but they now insist that colored persons 
shall not enjoy political rights. Liberty has been won. 
The battle for Equality is still pending. And now a new 
compromise is proposed, by which colored persons are to 
be sacrificed in the name of State Kights. It is sad that 
it should be so. But I do not despair. The cause 
may be delayed ; but it cannot be lost ; and all who 
set themselves against it will be overborne; for it is the 
cause of Humanity. Not the rich and proud, but the 
poor and lowly, will be the favorites of an enfranchised 
Republic. The words of the prophet will be fulfilled ; 
" and I will punish the people for their evil, and the 
wicked for their iniquity, and I will cause the arrogance 
of the proud to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness 
of the terrible. I WILL MAKE A MAN MORE 
PRECIOUS THAN FINE GOLD, EVEN A MAN, 
THAN THE GOLDEN WEDGE OF OPHIR." I 
catch these sublime words of prophecy, and echo them 
back as the assurance of triumph. 

Fellow-citizens, your task is before you. Mourn not the 
dead, but rejoice in his life and example. Rejoice as you 
point to this child of the people who was lifted so high, that 



61 



Republican Institutions became manifest in him. Rejoice 
that through him Emancipation was proclaimed. Above 
all, see to it that his constant vows are fulfilled, and that 
the promises of the Fathers are maintained, so that no 
person in the upright form of man can be shut out from 
their protection. Then will the Unity of the Republic be 
fixed on a foundation that cannot fail, and other nations 
will enjoy its • security. The corner-stone of National 
Independence is already in its place, and on it is in- 
scribed the name of George Washington. There is an- 
other stone which must have its place at the corner 
also. This is the Declaration of Independence, with all 
its promises fulfilled. On this stone we will gratefully 
inscribe the name of Abraham Lincoln. 






LB S '12 



